Vagrant Story is one of my favorite games from that era. I think you should play it without question. I didn't enjoy PE II nearly as much as the original. The first PE was great to me because it was like a Resident Evil RPG. Some people didn't like it, I thoroughly did. PE II is barely an RPG at all. It's almost all action-adventure in my opinion. You have a healing spell and that's about it, which I don't see why they even bothered to go that route after stripping away the other RPG elements. I hold the first game in high regard, so don't misunderstand - I don't think II is a bad game at all. A lot people thought it was better, actually. If you really liked the formula of the original, though, it might be disappointing playing the sequel. That's how it was for me. I enjoyed it, but would have rather it been more like I.